Discipline

I spent most of 2025 triaging and debugging system behaviors. Thankless, but important work that I certainly used AI to help with, but not exactly an area where AI shines. Now, it's a time for building and like many engineers, I find myself re-learning how to build and maintain software entirely. I read this insightful post during the holidays, but I did not internalize what the post meant until I started building this year.

The speed is intoxicating and I understand the brake metaphor now. There is a lot of finger-wagging circulating about using AI responsibly that I find odd. The responsibilities are all the same as before. Unnerving at first, but I am enjoying the challenge with a new silver lining that being incorrect carries a much lower correction cost — you can just fix it.

What I do find helpful and inspiring is the sharing culture that has emerged among engineers as we all figure this out. Here is how this is playing out for me these days.

What is working

• Research, Plan, Implement  — I appreciate the research phase specifically that helps me understand what is being built.
• CodeLayer — A preference thing mostly, but I find the UX delightful for switching between tasks.
• Letting go of Android Studio and the IDE in general — a little awkward at first, but I like it. Specifically it helps me to think at a different abstraction layer above the code.

What is rough

• Code reviews — the line between building and reviewing is thin now.
• Collaboration — while AI undoubtedly makes individuals more productive, I find that coordinating across team mates is challenging.
• Verbosity and duplication — generated code gets you the outcome faster, but I find that agents don't always find the opportunities to reuse or repurpose existing facilities.

I keep reflecting on this point that engineers focused on outcomes versus implementation details will thrive in this new era. The point resonates, but in large mobile code bases structural decisions are important and can impact outcomes and maintainability, at least they use to. Good luck out there, and keep sharing. It helps. ❤️